University of Trento

For the first time, researchers have identified how the mutated p53 protein drives cancer growth

Medical

Rethinking cancer? Study reveals mutant protein’s role in tumor growth

A new study has identified, for the first time, how the mutated protein p53, present in half of all human cancers, drives tumor growth. The discovery will not only facilitate a rethink of the way cancer is treated but may lead to new therapeutics.

Chemical analysis of a mummy has now revealed that the mummification process was being performed 1,500 years earlier than previously thought, across a wider area

Science

Prehistoric mummy shows embalming took place 1,500 years before the Pharaohs

Mummification is usually associated with the age of Pharaohs, but it didn't spring up overnight. Now an international team has found further evidence that deliberate mummification was taking place a millennium and a half earlier and across a much wider area of Egypt than previously believed.

When spiders are given water laced with graphene or carbon nanotubes, the material gets passed into their silk

Materials

Graphene-fed spiders spin bionic silk

Natural spider silk is already amazingly strong stuff, plus scientists have developed synthetic versions of the material. Now, however, researchers have split the difference – they've created silk that comes from spiders, but that has added man-made ingredients which give it extra strength.